Friday, June 19, 2009

Constructive Criticism

There are two kinds of people in the world: those who can accept constructive criticism and those who throw a screaming tantrum at the slightest suggestion can't. 

For some time now, my brother has been concerned that the brilliant content of Two Kinds of People has been obscured by the faded newsprint background (see photo). I believe his exact words were: "I can't read the damn thing."

read•a•bil•i•ty (noun) — accessibility of text: a measure of the ease with which a passage or text may be read.

Now, being the flexible, mature, stable adult that I am, I have completely ignored his comments in the months since the blog's redesign. Recently, however, he has become more persuasive ("I mean it. I can't read it at all."), so I have modified the design just a bit to accommodate his failing vision. (I'll let you in on a little family secret: he used to be younger than I am, but now he is older.)

As always, I'm interested in most all of your comments and feedback. Please vote in the poll below or leave a comment by clicking here

"Design is not just what it looks like and feels like. 
Design is how it works."
— Steve Jobs

5 comments:

Amy Sue Nathan said...

I think it's a lovely background. Me and my progressive trifocals see everything just fine. It's a food blog written by a man, right?

;)

Anonymous said...

... I like newsprint...

Anyway. So you know the design shop by our house? That has inspirational quotes about design in the window?

"Details aren't details. They make the product."

So. Hah! I prefer the newsprint. Bland white space flips me out. It just looks like the page was cut off, if you were going to do that and exclude the newsprint, I would pick a fading beige / red (right to left, respectively), background to accommodate the remaining image.

Constructive crictism is just fine. As long as it actually comes with the constructiveness (*ACHEM* English / History teachers).

And from the image you posted of the original fading newsprint, it looks harmless.

ian said...

I have to admit the background did bother me the first few times i visited the blog, but after a while it faded out of my perception.

I think it looks nicer without the background. Websites with background images are so last century! ;)

Susan Bearman said...

"Last century?" Geez, my whole blog is only a year old. But I have taken the criticism and heeded it. No more blurry backgrounds.

Carolyn Brandt Broughton said...

The faded newsprint is not an issue for me. Just as an imaginative set enhances the play, the cool newsprint-y, harlequin-y background sets a fun, funky, imaginative stage for your thought-provoking words. Love it.